Teen Drug & Alcohol Therapy

SageWalk Wilderness School has provided students and families with intervention, assessment, and long range rehab treatment for over 10 years. SageWalk is a year round therapeutic program, licensed by the State of Oregon as an Outpatient Chemical Dependency Program for troubled teens.

SageWalk provides a unique safe, secure, and sober environment for students to discover the harm of using drugs and alcohol. The wilderness and absence of external distractions along with a DBT approach to therapy, provides the environment and support needed for a student to identify the changes they need to make in order to enjoy a normal healthy lifestyle.

Laurie Wilmot, LCSW, and Joshua LaCross CADCI are our Primary CD Counselors, with over 12 years combined experience as a Chemical Dependency Counselors working with at-risk youth and their families. Laurie and Joshua provide a dynamic therapeutic counseling team, utilizing a holistic approach, with the overall goal of increasing the student's motivation and commitment to life changes.

All students receive an ASAM (American Society of Addiction Medicine) Assessment and then placed in one of three levels of treatment. Narcotics Anonymous (NA) groups are also held in the field and each student works through a 12 step workbook with support from Laurie and Joshua. If a student is resisting the components of the 12 step model, Laurie and Joshua will then work with the student to compose additional and alternative treatment modalities to lead them forward to a sober healthy life style.

All students who graduate from SageWalk will leave with an assessment of their current risk for further drug use/abuse, and a home plan for continued success. Their Relapse Prevention Plan is team effort, constructed by the student, the parents, the SageWalk Therapist, and the student's CD Counselor.

Helpful Reading:

One of the finest compliments I receive from recovering alcoholics is that despite the fact that I am not an alcoholic, I understand how their minds work. I have profound respect for all the old sayings in AA. Some are open to interpretation - the "insanity of our disease" is a literal statement.

Thinking about giving up marijuana but not sure you’re ready to take the plunge? Well, here are 70 benefits of quitting – all first-hand accounts from previously heavy users about how life changes for the better once you don’t need to get high all the time.